Entering the fifth day of Robbi’s sabbatical, I am in good spirits. As are the children, for those of you who have been wondering. For the first few days, they kept asking, quizzically, “Where’s Mama?” And when I informed them that she was two blocks down the street drawing stuff in someone else’s house, they said, “Oh, right,” and went back to whatever it was they had been doing at the time—eating grapes, making lego planes, drawing on the easel, etc.
We have been seeing (and feeding) Robbi every day. She reports good progress on various projects, having spent the past few days drawing illustrations for our upcoming Society of Illustrators keynote. Next, she will turn to creating the final sketches for the LB Kids version of our book Babies Ruin Everything.
For my part, I am using the time away from Robbi and her distracting good looks to dive into a few projects that have been simmering in the background for a long time, a few middle grades manuscripts that aren’t going to finish themselves. One is about a little witch and her best friend (a monkey), one is about a boy who can see (and draw) what is not really there, and another about a brother and sister who solve problems together.
But enough about me. We spent the weekend enjoying ourselves, first attempting to figure out how many kids you can fit in one small pool and still have room for a dance party.
The answer is “at least six.”
While the kids were getting wet, we were enjoying the fruits, lovingly grilled to perfection.
It was exhausting having so much fun and eating so well.
Nevertheless, we headed West on Sunday to visit cousins near DC. The theme of restful basking continued, however.
And continued.
On and on.
And on.
We were there for a birthday party, which was at a little gymnasium.
Alden, who has grown up climbing and leaping out of our cat tower, took immediately to the exciting challenge of using actual gymnastics equipment.
She is seldom one to shirk from challenge or uncertainty, and the uneven bars seemed not to daunt her. She started on the bottom…
And, moments later, found herself at the top.
Meanwhile, Kato took his own approach to defying gravity.
There was no shortage of marching and shouting.
Punctuated by moments of quiet equilibrium.
And followed by chances for free-form leaping.
Eventually, Rip Van Winkle woke up and tried to figure out what was going on.
All that he cared about were the balloons and the fact that his was orange.
A fact which Kato helped make clear the next morning. Using a sharpie, he wrote out August’s name, turning each letter into a smiling face. Each letter except “A,” that is, which he turned into rocket ship (Kato loves rocket ships) with Mickey Mouse inside (August loves Mickey).
To further reduce the danger of balloon confusion, Kato labeled his own as well. I commend him for not consulting with me on the spelling front.
The real theme of the past few days has been legos, and the staggering varieties of space ships that can be made from one small bin of them.
Here is one with R2D2 at the wheel.
And here is another that “goes very, very, very fast.” This according to Kato. I have no reason to dispute the claim.
Now is the time of day when I go make breakfast, and so I will go. I hear the distant thunder of tiny feet charging toward me. Which is the only alarm clock that matters these days.
